Ayman Odeh

Ayman Odeh (1 January 1975-) was the chairman of the Joint List and Hadash parties in Israel from 2015. Odeh was born in Haifa to an Arab family, and he became a socialist politician and a follower of the ideals of Martin Luther King, Jr..

Biography
Ayman Odeh was born in Haifa, Israel on 1 January 1975 to a family of Sunni Muslim Arabs, and he was the only Muslim student at his Christian school; Odeh later became an atheist and a socialist. He joined Hadash and represented it on the Haifa City Council from 1998 to 2005, and he became the party's secretary-general in 2006. In 2015, he was elected as Hadash's new leader when Mohammed Barakeh resigned, and he gave the Joint List a more moderate and pragmatic face. Odeh was one of 13 Joint List candidates to be elected to the Knesset that year, and he expressed a willingness to work with his Jewish partners.